falcon and wolf 2

 

 

Chapter 2

 

 

The camp site to which Wolf led Luke was up a blind valley.

“There’s an old mine, worked out, but it makes a good place to hide,” said Wolf. “It looks as if it’s blocked by a cave-in, but I tunnelled round it, and covered the new way in with sacking covered in glue I made boiling down bones, and rubbed well in the tailings from it, so if you aren’t looking for another side entrance, you’d miss it.”

“Clever,” said Luke. “Back way out?”

“Always is, in these mines,” said Wolf. “No prospector wants to be caught out if there’s a fall. I got two bolt-holes, both well-concealed.”

“I am impressed,” said Luke.

Wolf shrugged.

“If there’s trouble, they blame the half-breed,” he said. “Scars too make man look villainous.”

“Even though caused by a real villain,” said Luke. “I trust you. You have no forked tongue.”

The horses might be led behind a pile of tailings, where a fair pasture opened out, and a rough shelter in a rock undercut, enlarged with hurdles.  Luke nodded in satisfaction.

“We take provisions inside,” said Wolf.

Luke grunted agreement.  They made the horses comfortable with some bran mash, and left them to help themselves to grass, and carried the things inside, taking several journeys. Luke found the hidden passage, but only because he was looking for it.

“A narrow squeeze,” he said.

“Plenty narrow; big man not make it,” said Wolf. “Waya the Wolf make plenty good lair.”

“Do you speak the way many Indians do to make people underestimate you?” asked Luke.

Wolf looked at him sideways.

“Ignorant savage no understand, so clever man inside him listen good,” he said.

Luke nodded. It made sense. Any man with a precarious place in society did what he could to make people underestimate him... or set out to intimidate them.  Luke preferred the latter, but he had no objection to playing the part of someone harmless to pick up information. With a very close shave, he had once taken the stage dressed as a woman, chasing a man who preyed on vulnerable women.

That had been amusing. He had also fleeced a card sharp who could not believe a woman could beat him at his own game.

He did not know Luke’s sisters.

Luke laughed in sheer joy of living.

“We can hold this place against all comers if we cache enough water, and make the Westons the most plumb miserable critters in the land,” he said.

“I like the way you think,” said Wolf.

 

oOoOo

 

Wolf watched, amused, as Luke went through a series of athletic dance moves the next day. He stopped being amused when Luke repeated the exercises with a knife in each hand.

“You’re pretty impressive,” said Wolf. “Teach me?”

“It’s called Hopak,” said Luke. “My folks were Cossacks before coming to America to escape the Russians.”

Wolf shrugged. He had no idea what ‘Russians’ were, and cared less. But he liked the idea of being able to move from knocked back to fighting in one move.

“I want to learn,” said Wolf.

“We’ll have time when we’re not doing anything else,” said Luke. “You got a sweat lodge?”

“In here? No.”

“We can build one, then. A good steam bath after exercise sets a man up for the day,” said Luke.

Wolf did not disagree.

“What’s your plan?” he asked.

“Ruin the Westons,” said Luke. “They’re bad medicine, and if not actual owlhoots, they’re two steps from it.”

“How we do this?” asked Wolf interested.

Luke grinned. It was not a pleasant grin.

“A couple of Cherokee braves spread stories of how the Weston cattle are made to look healthier than they are,” said Luke. “They use heap bad Apache medicine to hide sick animals.”

“Do the Apaches have medicine to hide sick animals?” asked Wolf.

“No idea; does it matter?” said Luke. “I know how some horse traders blow mustard down the throat of horses with glanders to make them seem to breathe easier, so I imagine there are ways to hide cattle disease.  It doesn’t matter if there is, or isn’t, so long as the men at the trading posts believe there is and believe our complaints that Weston cattle spread diseases.”

“I like the way you think,” said Wolf.

 

oOoOo

 

Two Cheyenne braves made their way towards a cattlehead, where buyers would purchase their choice of cattle to load onto the railroad and ship east for slaughter. They moved along the high ground, and Wolf put his hand to his eyes and squinted at a dust cloud.

“We no get there on time,” he said. “That Weston’s herd; I know the roan the cow boss rides. Mean bastard, name o’ Jake Kelly.”

“If they scatter, that will delay them for a considerable period,” said Luke. He unloaded two bullets from his Winchester, opening the cartridge and shaking out half the powder from each, and wadding the space with some dried grass.

“What you about?” asked Wolf.

“I don’t want to harm innocent animals, just sting them,” said Luke.

“You won’t hit at this range,” said Wolf.

“Watch me,” said Luke. He knelt, propping his Winchester on a rock to steady it. The telescopic sight helped somewhat, though the dust was just as obscuring.

“Which is the head of the herd? That big black bull?” he asked.

“Yes; reckon Weston has a new bull for siring calves, or he wouldn’t sell a stud,” said Wolf.

Luke did not ponder the reasons; the big bull was a good enough target.  He fired; and the bull jumped, convulsively, and ran away from the sharp sting in his flank. With a collective bellow, the herd followed.

Luke smiled, grimly.

“And if we also scatter the remuda, they’ll have to round up the spare saddle horses as well, and if they all run, they’ll tire themselves so the point of having a remuda of fresh horses is lost,” he said.

He picked a nervy looking paint in the middle of the remuda, some way from the wrangler in charge. This time he fired between the animal’s ears, horses being more inclined to be skittish at stray noises. He did not have to hit the beast, only scare it.

The paint reared, cycled its forelegs, and came down running, barging through the other spare horses.

Luke chucked. He reloaded with full charges. No point being out of ammunition.

“That bought us three, maybe four hours,” he said. “Forward!”

“You mighty handy with that gun,” said Wolf.

 

oOoOo

 

The Cherokees were not drunk.

You could not say they were sober, either.

Whichever way, they were gazed at warily in the bar as they rolled in through the batwings.

“Food,” said Luke. “We plenty hungry, and plenty angry too. You feed two for a quarter?”

“Twenty cents each, take it or leave it,” said the beefy woman behind the bar.

Luke counted out small change.

“We desperate, and it all the fault of Circle B rancher,” he grumbled.

“And why’s that, Injun?” asked the woman.

“His cattle full of disease,” said Luke.

“Ah. Him use Apache medicine to make um look well,” said Wolf.

“Plenty sick cattle, we live in peace, but when cattle take disease, what we do?” said Luke. “Make bad meat too. White man mighty big chiseller.”

“Him even sell stud to get rid of disease,” said Wolf, gloomily. 

 

It would get about.

And if there was one thing which was unforgiveable, it was the spreading of disease. The words of two Indians might not be readily believed, but the fortuitous selling of his stud bull gave some credence to the malicious rumour.

And cattlemen could not afford to take chances. Weston’s herd of five thousand cattle would be made to wait outside town until they showed they were clear of any sign of disease. And that meant that Weston had to feed them while they waited, and the prices might not be of the best.

It was a start.

It was more than a start.

Luke was not familiar with the word ‘psychology’ nor the French concept in vogue of the ‘psychological moment’ but he was perfectly familiar with the practice of predicting what types of people would do under various circumstances. Therefore, being familiar with the type of ranny who headed the cattle drive, Jake Kelly, he had no expectation that a man named a ‘mean bastard’ would take it lying down to be told to wait outside town with his herd.  The two ‘Cherokee braves’ slipped out of the town as anonymously as they had slid into it, just as the marshals were halting the Circle B drive.

There was a lot of bad language arising from the encounter. Kelly knew fine well his cattle had no disease, and to hold off with them irked him beyond measure. His verbal protestations that his herd were all healthy was to no avail, whereupon, being the sort of man who thinks with his fists, with or without six-shooters in them, he opened fire. By the time Wolf and Luke had to strain their ears to hear it, there was a regular shooting war going on, with other cattle drovers joining the marshals to keep out potentially diseased beasts.

“It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good,” said Luke, philsophically. “With half the hands off with the beeves, we have a better chance of rescuing Mrs. Barton.”

“Weston keeps a bunk house for prisoners,” said Wolf. “With brazier for tools to burn, and knives, him lock um away until needed.”

“Good; easier to get to than the main farm house,” said Luke.

“Bars on window, guard outside,” said Wolf. “Guard no carry key.”

“Good job I didn’t use all the gunpowder then,” said Luke.

“Hate to say this, white man, but gunpowder make heap big noise,” drawled Wolf.

“Indian scout no worry, white man make heap big think-think,” said Luke.

Wolf laughed.

“You bastard, taking the mock,” he said.

“And you don’t?”

Both young men laughed.

 

 

They made good time back to a bluff overlooking the Weston ranch.

“Which bunkhouse?” asked Luke.

“The one over by that stand of trees; there’s a spring,” said Wolf.

“We need to know this land so well we can walk it in the dark, because that’s what we’ll be doing,” said Luke. “Would you rather be killing guards and blowing out bars, or running a diversion?”

“Wolf happier without gunpowder,” said Wolf.

“Fine. We need to make some torches; they don’t have to burn long. You find some cattle, tie torch to horn, and light them. Half a dozen ought to do it. Get up a good stampede and I could blast my way into hell, and Weston won’t hear it. Then, you get into town and take the sheriff to our camp.”

“Uh.” Grunted Wolf.

There were a sufficiency of plants with aromatic oils which would make torches of a sort, and they spent the rest of the daylight hours making them.  Wolf circled round one way as Luke went down onto the plain, leading Blackwind down the arroyos, using the folded ground, keeping low on foot, and calling to his mount to lie down if he suspected being overlooked. In this manner, Luke approached the bunkhouse from the rear.  The cowboy on guard was not especially alert and plainly did not think he had much to fear.

He had little time to fear, since the knife which slit his throat appeared out of what seemed like nowhere. Luke caught the body and eased it down silently, going to see if there was a guard on the front.

There was.

He was plainly bored, playing with his gun.

He, also, was briefly not bored, but did not live long enough to appreciate the virtues of boredom.

Luke checked both of them for a key; but it was not going to be that easy. He had suspected it would not. He looked in the window; a woman sat in resignation by a table.

“Mrs. Barton?” said Luke. Her head shot up.

“Who are you?” she asked, sharply.

“Just call me the seventh cavalry,” said Luke. “Ma’am, listen to me; I want you to put that table on its side, and the mattress and any covers over it, and get behind it. And stay there until there’s room to come out.”

The woman nodded, and did as he bade her. Luke set up and tamped his gunpowder behind sacks of sand, deciding to blow out the window rather than risk ricochetting splinters from the door, which was sturdier than most bunkhouse doors.

“You might want to use the necessary house if it’s in the leanto,” said Luke. “If you only have chamberpot, I’m not looking.”

“Thank you for your civility,” said Mrs. Barton. “No lean-to.”

Luke listened for her to have finished and for sounds of her creeping back into her shelter.

“Be about three minutes,” he said, his sharp eyes catching points of light being kindled across the valley.

In two minutes there was a sound like distant thunder, or maybe cavalry at a distance, coming closer, and getting louder. Luke struck a match on the seat of his own levis, and set it to the fuse, dodging back around the corner of the bunkhouse.

The thundering grew louder, and there were yells and activity around the main house, light spilling out of doors, and men coming to see what was happening.

And then there was a CRUMP as Luke’s charges went off.

He moved round to the front, waving away dust from the adobe structure; and found that the window had blown in nicely.

The bars, still incongruously in the window frame, had blown clear across the room. Luke was glad he had suggested making a shelter; the thought of those bars in a frame acting on a body like a vegetable mandolin was unnerving.

“Ma’am?” he said. “You can come out now.”

Mrs. Barton emerged, looking a little pale.

“Greetings, Mr. Seventh Cavalry,” she said. “Won’t they try to hurt my husband?”

“He should arrive at a safe place right about the same time we do,” said Luke. “Can you climb out if I help you?”

“Of course I can; I’m no effete fool like some,” said Mrs. Barton. “Just give me a hand as I climb on the rubble.”

A few minutes later, and Mrs. Barton was mounted on Blackwind, with Luke running alongside the trotting horse, the nightsight of those at the ranch spoiled with lanterns as they ran about catching and turning cattle.

Mrs. Barton placed herself entirely in Luke’s hands.

She was certain that he was no part of Weston’s outfit; what his angle was, she could not know, but being away from a bunkhouse which had instruments of torture locked in cabinets where she could see them and worry about them without being able to reach them to use as weapons was a priority worth having.

When she found herself led through winding passages of old mine shaft, she wondered what she was getting into; and then as they came into the light, her husband was there. She threw herself on him.

“Jed, oh, Jed!” she cried.

“There, Lily, don’t fret no more,” said Barton. “Did that bastard lay hands on you?”

“No, Jed, but he showed me tools, and he said what he could do.”

“He’ll suffer, Jed,” said Luke. “We’ll fix you two a nice little apartment in a blind tunnel. We set up a few in case we had guests, and a nice sink-hole dug at the back for personal comfort, and no flies in here to cause you discomfort, and kerosene a-plenty to put on it to kill the smells.  You’re going to have to disappear, lawman, while they wonder where you’ve gone, and who you’ve told. And we’ll visit Armageddon on the whole darned family. I’m not leaving here until I have Wily Willy, and if that means winnowing through all of his brothers, then so be it.”

“They pay,” said Wolf, softly. “They pay in full measure. With interest.”

“You know,” said Barton, “I’m glad you’re on the side of the law, both of you.”

Luke gave him a mirthless grin.

It sent shivers up the sheriff’s spine; as it had done to other men before.